Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
Wicked: The Life Times of the Wicked Witch of the West is the first novel in Gregory Maguire's The Wicked Years ''and illustrated by Douglas Smith. It is a revisionist look of the Land of Oz and it's characters from L. Frank Baum's 1900 novel, ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and the 1939 MGM film, The Wizard of Oz. Unlike the 1939 film and Baum's book, this novel is not directed at children;it contains adult language and content, including violent imagery and sexual situations. It is the first of The Wicked Years series, followed by Son of a Witch (published in 2005), A Lion Among Men (published in 2008), and Out of Oz (published in 2011). In 2003, it became the basis for the Broadway musical, Wicked: The Untold Story of the Witches of Oz. The novel presents events, characters and situations from Baum's book and i 1939 film in new ways, making numerous alterations. The social strife described in The Wicked Years indicates that the 1900 book and the 1939 film are set in similar and internally consistent but distinct versions of Oz. Plot summary The novel is a political, social, and ethical commentary on the nature of good and evil, and takes place in The Land of Oz, in the years leading to Dorothy's arrival. The story centers on Elphaba Thropp, the misunderstood green-skinned girl who grows up to become the notorious Wicked Witch of the West. Gregory Maguire fashioned the name of Elphaba, from the initials of Lyman Frank Baum, L-F-B. The story is divided into five different sections based on the plot location. There is also a prologue where Elphaba is spying on Dorothy and her friends, hearing them gossip about her. Munchkinlanders Elphaba is born to Melena Thropp, the granddaughter of the Eminent Thropp of Munchkinland , and Frexspar Thropp, an itinerant unionist minister. Frex is the son of a seventh son, and the seventh pastor in his family. Because Melena married lower than her family's social standing she is unhappy in her marriage and is known to have many other men in her life. Though it does not become clear until much later, Melena is at some point approached by a mysterious stranger, who gives her a potion called "Miracle Elixir" from a green bottle. He seduces her and nine months later she gives birth to a child, Elphaba Thropp, inside a device called The Clock of the Time Dragon (a prophetic enchanted tik-tok device), as her husband is attacked by a lynch mob to another location Elphaba is born with green skin, sharp teeth, is seemingly savage, biting at anyone and anything forcing her parents to fashion a muzzle, so she cannot hurt herself or others and is terrified of water, even as a newborn. Frex believes the baby is punishment from the Unnamed god for failing to protect his parishioners while Melena has trouble bonding with and caring for Melena then calls on her childhood nanny for help. With Nanny there to help, Frex decides to leave home to travel spreading the word of the Unnamed God. To dull the pain of raising a difficult child and loneliness while Frex is away, Melena chews pinlobble leaves and drinks heavily. About a year and a half later, a traveling Quadling glassblower named Turtle Heart visits the home of Melena and Frex. Melena offers him food and drink, and Turtle Heart blows a beautiful glass reflecting ball for Elphaba. With Frex absent for extended periods, preaching to the Munchkinlanders, Turtle Heart and Melena begin a secret affair. When Frex returns, he befriends Turtle Heart (seemingly ignorant of the relationship between the Quadling and his wife), out of both unionist charity (Quadlings, after all, "ranked about as low on the social ladder as it was possible to get and still be human"), religious zeal (Quadlings have no concept of religion, so Frex sees Turtle Heart as a potential convert) and an attraction to Turtle Heart on his own accord At the end of the first part, Melena is pregnant with Elphaba's younger sister Nessarose Thropp or "Nessa" for short. It is unknown whether the father is Frex or Turtle Heart. Melena orders Nanny to ensure her second child will not be born green like her firstborn, but it has unforeseen consequences. Nessarose is born as pink as Elphaba is green, but more importantly, she is disabled (she has no arms), she requires constant supervision and care. Nessarose eventually embraces Frex's zealotry and, thus, she is her father's favorite, to Elphaba's lasting angst. Gillikin On a steam train enroute to Shiz, a city in southwestern Gillikin. Two of the train's passengers, Doctor Dillamond and Galinda, are bound for Shiz University. Upon arrival, Doctor Dillamond retreats to his professors' quarters and Galinda heads off to Crage Hall, the women's university. Having lost her chaperone, Ama Clutch, during the train ride to Shiz (Ama Clutch stepped on a rusty nail and stayed behind for medical treatment), Galinda has no one to represent her in her Ama's roommate negotiations. Refusing to bunk with the common girls in the group dormitory (the Pink Dormitory), Galinda is forced to room with seventeen-year-old Elphaba, with whom she does not get along very well at first. Elphaba, being green, is not interested in socializing, and Galinda, who descends from the noble Arduenna Clan of Gillikin on her mother's side, is more interested in climbing the social ladder than becoming friends with her outcast roommate. Later, Galinda (after having a fight with her new friends) tries to mock Elphaba by making her wear a hat that she was sure Elphaba would look hideous in. When she realizes that Elphaba actually looks quite pretty in the hat, Galinda says so, partly horrified that she talked to the "green girl." They start talking about evil and the nature of evil, a subject on which they both agree and disagree. Elphaba shows Galinda how she thinks more critically, and they start attending Doctor Dillamond's biology lectures together. Doctor Dillamond is a sentient Goat, and part of a minority of talking Animals (distinguished from non-sentient animals throughout the book through capitalization of the 'A' at the beginning of the word) that hold civil rights equal to humans. Doctor Dillamond informs the class that, under the despotic reign of the Wizard of Oz, Animals are being discriminated against, treated like regular (non-sentient) animals and, in some cases, forced to return to the fields. (It should be noted that, as mentioned on the train ride to Shiz, Doctor Dillamond's ancient mother at this time cannot afford to travel first class, and will have to ride in a pen if she wants to visit Doctor Dillamond at Shiz). Doctor Dillamond's fears that Animal discrimination is becoming widespread are seemingly confirmed by Madame Morrible (whom Elphaba nicknames "Horrible Morrible"), the Headmistress of Crage Hall at Shiz University. Morrible later holds a poetry soiree that turns out to be nothing more than a forum for her propagandizing through use of quells, one of which ends with the following phrase: Animals should be seen and not heard. Elphaba is drawn to the Animal rights movement early on and she later becomes Doctor Dillamond's secretary and lab assistant. Elphaba becomes friends with a Munchkin boy named Boq, son of Bfee, the Mayor of Rush Margins, which was the town in which Elphaba was born. Boq develops a crush on Galinda. As she is a tall Gillikinese, and he is a short Munchkinlander, she rebuffs him. He hopes his friendship with Elphaba will bring him closer to Galinda; through Elphaba he ends up becoming wrapped up in Elphaba and Doctor Dillamond's cause. However, their friendship is shaken when Doctor Dillamond is murdered while on the verge of a great discovery about the genetic similarities between humans and Animals; Galinda's chaperone Ama Clutch witnesses Madame Morrible's wind-up servant Grommetik kill Dillamond, but she is magicked into a false stupor to keep her quiet. Galinda is wracked with guilt over what has happened to Ama Clutch, but it is the murder of Doctor Dillamond that has the most profound impact on her. In his memory, Galinda adopts Dr. Dillamond's mispronunciation of her name, Glinda, and throws herself into her studies, having settled on a course of study in Sorcery, at Madame Morrible's insistence. Glinda and Elphaba become close friends. Boq's crush on Glinda eventually subsides, and they all become friends with a Vinkus Prince named Fiyero Tigelaar, a quiet boy who speaks little of the Oz-language, but draws attention by his strange customs and pattern of blue diamond tattoos all across his body and who is new to Shiz, and Elphaba's sister Nessarose, who is called up to Shiz, ostensibly to bring a new chaperone for Glinda and Elphaba, Nanny. Frex sends Nessa, his favorite child, a "back-to-school" gift, a pair of shoes covered with hand-blown glass beads, a technique taught to him by Turtle Heart. The shoes are a big deal for all parties involved, and come as a blow to Elphaba, reminding her once more of her father's favoritism. When the shoes arrive, Elphaba looks quickly through the box, and immediately realizes there is nothing for her. Nessa tells her not to be "cross," but the reader does not quite understand how Elphie feels about this development until a bit later, when she claims that she "had gotten over the sting of being overlooked by Frex." The shoes would later become priceless to Elphaba, her obsession with posessing them eventually led to her demise. Elphaba carries on the research of deceased Doctor Dillamond in secret. Over time, Ama Clutch's condition gradually deteriorates and, when it is clear that she is about to die, Glinda tries to use magic to bring her out of her stupor. Her lucidity briefly restored, Ama Clutch tells Glinda that she witnessed Grommetik kill Doctor Dillamond, which he could only have done on the order of Madame Morrible. After Ama Clutch's funeral, Elphaba, Glinda and Nessarose are almost convinced by Madame Morrible to become silent pawns of the Wizard, his loyal Adepts, so-called "ambassadors of peace". Elphaba was to go east, to Munchkinland; Glinda further north in Gillikin; Nessarose south, to Quadling Country, with no one to go west because so few people lived there. While Elphaba is reluctant to accept this position, Glinda is entranced. When they try to discuss the situation with one another, they find they can't, because they are bound by a spell that prevents them from discussing Morrible's proposition. Unwilling to remain silent, Elphaba decides that something must be done. She and Glinda travel to the Emerald City , where they meet the The Wizard and plead the case of the Animals. However, the Wizard of Oz dismisses their concerns out of hand, and Glinda and Elphaba have no choice but to return to Shiz. However, Elphaba finds that she cannot continue living under Morrible as she has been, and stays behind in the City. She sends a tearful, distraught Glinda back alone, after saying that they cannot see each other again. Elphaba has decided to take matters into her own hands. 'City of Emeralds' Almost five years have passed since Elphaba has seen Glinda, Boq, or any of her other friends from college and she now lives in the Emerald City, secretly involved in the movement to help free the Animals and get rid of the Wizard of Oz. Fiyero, now a Prince with 3 children, who has come to the Emerald City to settle business with politicians, and he sees Elphaba praying to a likeness of St. Glinda. At first Elphaba denies being the girl he once knew from Shiz and evades Fiyero, but eventually she gives in when he follows her home. After this, they start to reconnect. He discovers she has started to take up magic, and tells her that Nessa has taken a class in sorcery. He also explains that Glinda is now a sorceress and that both girls miss Elphaba. She and Fiyero begin to have an illicit love affair, and he neglects his wife Sarima and his children, Irji, Manek and Nor. The two lovers are at peace, and despite their occasionally conflicting personalities, Elphaba is actually very happy at this point in her life. Her life changes one night, Lurlinemas Eve, when she can finally fulfill her task: kill Madame Morrible. Fiyero follows her, but she cannot complete her task due to a group of children interfering with Elphaba's line of fire. He returns to her apartment to wait for her, where the Gale Force, the Wizard's secret police force who are looking for Elphaba, kill him. Elphaba escapes from the City, and runs to a mauntery, where she meets an elderly woman named Yackle, formerly the dame of the Philosophy Club. Yackle takes the now homeless Elphaba, turned mute from grief after Fiyero's murder, under her wing. 'In the Vinkus' Having been unconscious for almost a year, and then a mute for six more years, Elphaba goes to the Vinkus, the land where Fiyero was prince, and meets his wife and children. Elphaba brings along a boy named Liir, to whom she claims no relation, and stays at the castle Kiamo Ko for a year and a half or so. She attempts to tell Sarima, Fiyero's wife, of their affair, but Sarima refuses, saying she does not want to talk about her late husband. Fiyero's family, Elphaba, and Liir unexpectedly become a family unit, and are joined by Nanny after some time. While staying at the castle, Elphaba also discovers a mysterious book of spells that she calls a 'Grimmerie', and begins to study its contents. It ends up such that Elphaba is the only one in Oz who can read its contents. However, when Manek, one of Sarima's sons, convinces her son Liir during a game of hide and seek to hide in a fish-well, Liir nearly dies. Elphaba's anger at Manek causes an icicle to fall and kill him. The experience makes Elphaba realize that she has motherly tendencies towards Liir, and that she claims responsibility as Liir's mother. Yet she discovers that her newfound warmth is not reciprocated. Liir claims that while he was in the well, a Fish told him he was Fiyero's son and therefore cannot be her son. As Sarima grieves for Manek, and the family starts to fall apart. Elphaba gets a letter from her father Frex, asking her to come help him with Nessarose, who has taken Elphaba's position of Eminent Thropp of Munchkinland. When she arrives, Frex asks her to help him talk to Nessa, whom Elphaba discovers has become a witch, called the Wicked Witch of the East. Elphaba leaves after Nessa promises to give Elphaba the infamous ruby shoes after she dies. (Glinda enchanted them to allow Nessa to walk without help). When Elphaba returns, she finds everyone gone except Nanny. Nanny explains that the soldiers who were staying in the house made everyone in the town leave except for her, all of them under the hopes that Elphaba can save them. Elphaba vows to do everything in her power to get everyone back. 'The Murder and Its Afterlife' Seven years later, a storm visits Munchkinland, dropping a house on Nessa, killing her. The house contains a young adolescent farm girl named Dorothy Gale and a dog named Toto. Glinda, who was nearby, sent Dorothy off with Nessa's shoes for fear of potential civil war in Munchkinland and also for Dorothy's safety. She sent her to the Wizard in hopes that he could send her back to Kansas. Elphaba comes to the funeral for Nessa. The two women, old friends who still love each other dearly, rejoice at being reconcilied after more than a decade. The two talk of their titles, which all Oz know, and catch up on what has happened in their time apart.. When Glinda tells Elphaba that she gave Nessa's shoes to Dorothy, Elphaba becomes furious with Glinda and flies into a rage, insisting that the shoes were rightfully hers. She later has a meeting with the Wizard to bargain for the release of Nor, who Elphaba learns is the last survivor of Fiyero's family. The Wizard, however, refuses to make any bargains. On her way back to Kiamo Ko, Elphaba stops at Shiz to kill Madame Morrible, by bashing a trophy on her skull. However, it is revealed that Madame Morrible had died only minutes before Elphaba came to murder her. Regardless, Elphaba decides to claim to have committed the murder and confesses to Avaric, an old schoolmate, so that she will get the credit when the news spreads. She comes upon the Clock of the Time Dragon, which puts on a special show for her. It shows the Wizard, and not Frex, to be her father. Some time after returning to Kiamo Ko, Elphaba finds out that Dorothy and a few friends are headed to Kiamo Ko, presumably to kill her under the Wizard' orders. When the friends are almost to the castle, Elphaba (who believed that the Scarecrow was her beloved Fiyero) sends her dog Killyjoy out to lead the friends to the castle. They misunderstand the group of dogs howling toward them and the Tin Woodman kills the dogs. The Scarecrow scares away the crows Elphaba sends next. Elphaba sends her bees, which are killed as well, and Elphaba is forced to believe the Scarecrow is what he seems: just a scarecrow. With all her pets gone, the shock of this revelation only serves to further unhinge her. When Dorothy arrives, she tells Elphaba that the Wizard did indeed send her to kill the witch, but Dorothy herself came to apologize for killing her sister. Furious that Dorothy is asking for the forgiveness that she (Elphaba) has never received for her own perceived sins, Elphaba waves her now burning broom in the air and inadvertently sets her black dress and cape on fire. Innocently, Dorothy throws a bucket of water on her to save her, but instead the water melts her, leaving nothing but her clothes, and the infamous hat on the floor where she once stood. Dorothy returns to the Wizard with the green potion bottle he used to subdue Elphaba's mother during her conception, upsetting him when he realizes Elphaba was his daughter. Dorothy does not bring back the Grimmerie because it was too heavy. Rumors abound through Oz about the whereabouts of Dorothy (and her dog), few actually believing that she returned to Kansas. The Wizard plans his departure from Oz and his ensuing suicide when he returns to America. The last lines of the book seem to imply that Elphaba will rise from the ashes some day: "And there the wicked old Witch stayed for a good long time." "And did she ever come out?" "Not yet." Praise "Amazing novel." --John Updike, in The New Yorker "Save a place on the shelf between Alice and The Hobbit--that spot is well deserved." ''--Kirkus Reviews'' "Very close to being an instant classic... Maguire has hit a home run his first time at bat" ''--Memphis Commercial Appeal'' "Wicked is a punchy allegory that alludes to everything from Naiz Germany to Nixon's America. It's delightfully over the top at times, mixing serious metafiction with subtle humor and even (gasp) witch sex." ''--Boston Phoenix'' "A fantasy novel that reads like Graham Greene at his best." ''--San Jose Mercury News'' "Gregory Maguire has taken this figure of childhood fantasy and given her a sensual and powerful nature that will stir adult hearts with fear and longing all over again." --''New Orleans Times-Picayune'' "Maguire combines puckish humor and bracing pessimism in this fantasical meditation on good and evil, God and free will, which should.... captivate devotees of fantasy." --''Publishers Weekly'' "Maguire's adult fale examines some of literature's magor themes: moral ambiguity, the nature of evil, the bittersweet dividends of power, the high costs of love. Elphaba--the Wicked Witch of the West--is as scary as ever, but this time in a different way: She's undeniably human. She's us." --Wally Lamb'', author of ''She's Come Undone'' and'' I Know This Much is True "Starting with the Wizard of Oz material, Gregory Maguire has added greater depths and different facets, creating something altogether different and unique. It's magnificent work, a genuine tour de force." --Lloyd Alexander, author of The Chronicles of Prydain "Gregory Maguire's donné in Wicked are from Baum's land of Oz; but everything here has been recu to sparkle fresh and new, with illuminations shining in unexpected directions. Funny and serious, pulsing with imaginative energy, encompassing poliical thriller and moral reflection, this is truely a fabulous novel." --Jill Paton Walsh, author of Knowledge of Angels "Here is a story that is at once a page-turner and a powerful stimulus to thought." John Rowe Townsend, author of The Islanders "This book is a glorious frolic, a feast of language, a study of good and evil, and a massibe history of the favulous land of Oz." --Jane Langton, author of The Diamond in the Window 'Interesting Facts' *Through out the next three books it is hinted that Elphaba may come back - or already has. In "Son of a Witch" Nor wrote "Elphaba lives" in graffiti in the Emerald city. In "A Lion among Men" Yackle, as she is being pulled into the Grimmerie, exclaims "She's coming back! Don't you see, she's comming back-". And in "Out of Oz", after Mombi performs the spell - "To Bring the Lost Forward", Ozians start thinking that Elphaba was called back from where ever she went. Category:The Wicked Years Category:Books